“… and are now back to pre-hurricane levels. About 343,000 people filed initial jobless claims last week, 29,000 fewer than those who sought help in the previous week, the Labor Department reported Thursday…Economists often prefer to look at a four-week moving average, which smooths out the volatility in the weekly numbers. That average fell to 381,500 last week, after also spiking in the wake of Superstorm Sandy.” Full story at…
http://money.cnn.com/2012/12/13/news/economy/unemployment-benefits/index.html?iid=HP_LN
GRADE THE RECESSIOVERY (ZeroHedge)
“Here, for your comparative studies
analytical viewing pleasure, is the current http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2012-12-13/grade-recessiovery
Zerohedge presents charts
that compare this recession to previous ones.
For the most part, the charts show this “Great Recession” recovery to be
on the low end of recovery and some charts show downtrends currently underway. Surprisingly, unemployment claims didn’t
appear to be out of line with past recessions, regardless of FOMC statements to
the contrary. Decide for yourself.
MEDICARE
As reported by Reuters, the
White House said that raising the Medicare eligibility age is “off the table”. This is distressing news. Medicare is the elephant in the room. If there is no significant change to Medicare,
the deficit talks will yield almost nothing.
The dollar amounts under discussion (The current Democratic offer is $120-billion
in tax increases per year - I can’t even find the spending cuts under
discussion.) are way too low. We are
running budget deficits in excess of 1-trillion per year. A “fix” that reduces the annual deficit by only
10% just kicks the ticking-bomb down the road.
MARKET RECAP
Thursday the S&P 500 was down 0.6% to 1419 (rounded). VIX was up a bit less than 4% to 15.56.
The markets were down
almost all day until it “leaked” that Boehner was meeting with President Obama
at 5 PM. Stocks rallied a bit toward the
end of the day only to fall off at the close.
NTSM
The NTSM analysis remained HOLD Thursday. Indicators, like the market, are simply
drifting.
MY INVESTED POSITION
Based on the SELL signal, 7 November 2012, I
moved out of the stock market at 1377 on the S&P 500. Because of the extreme negativity I have
noted from Hussman and others, I am currently invested in a range of near 15%
invested in stocks and I am still holding short positions.
